


Soldier

by lalaland666 (orphan_account)



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale Has PTSD (Good Omens), Aziraphale fought in the War, Aziraphale is a soldier, Character Study, Gen, M/M, No betas- we fall like angels, The Fall (Good Omens), War in Heaven (Good Omens), the flaming sword
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-24 20:28:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22004008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/lalaland666
Summary: Aziraphale was a soldier. A platoon leader, even. He’d fought in the War, in the Rebellion, and he’d been good at it. Good at fighting.Good at killing.That didn’t mean he hadlikedit.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 133





	Soldier

**Author's Note:**

> as per usual, I wrote this in 45 minutes at 2 am, so please forgive my mistakes

Aziraphale was a soldier. A platoon leader, even. He’d fought in the War, in the Rebellion, and he’d been good at it. Good at fighting. 

Good at killing. 

That didn’t mean he had _liked_ it. It didn’t mean he had enjoyed being good at it. It didn’t mean that he didn’t weep (later, much later, to be soft and weak and sad on the battlefield was suicide and the flaming sword bore the blood to prove it) for every life he took, for every poor angel whom he’d slain. It didn’t mean that the holy fire that had lit his sword hadn’t scorched his own hands as well. 

But Aziraphale was a soldier. He was an angel. And to be an angel, after the Fall, was to obey. So he’d done what he was ordered to do, he’d slaughtered and maimed and burned as he was told, and he’d watched with a heavy heart (and tears in his eyes, tears that he could _never_ let spill) as the Fallen were tossed into the abyss. He was a soldier, and soldiers didn’t mourn the passing of their enemies. 

The reconstruction of Heaven was the top priority, in the days following the Fall. So much so that God’s newest creation, a little garden on a new planet with all manner of fascinating creatures within it, went almost unnoticed. So much so that Gabriel, who was in charge of both this newest project and the reconstruction, forgot to station someone there to guard against their newly-made enemies. And so Aziraphale had volunteered, as much to get away as to help. He’d been transferred from Michael’s command to Gabriel’s, and sent to the Eastern Gate of Eden effective immediately. 

It was quiet, there. Quiet, but alive. Messy, but not in a way that bore the hallmarks of destruction. 

And there were no other angels there. 

Aziraphale had watched the humans for the first two days– Adam and Eve, their names were. They were kind, and sweet, and innocent, and they had never seen the horrors of war. Aziraphale envied them their innocence, almost as much as he loved them. And he had loved them. But Aziraphale was a soldier. He was meant to follow orders, to tow the line. He was meant to guard, to protect, not to love the beings he was meant to be saving. 

But Aziraphale was also _kind_. He was a soldier, yes, but one who had hated the fighting, the killing. And these new, wonderful creatures, so open and unafraid, reminded him of how things had been, back when he’d been allowed to be soft and warm and kind and welcoming. He hadn’t really fit in, then, not with either group that would later become the sides in the war, and things had only gotten worse afterwards, when Heaven had put up its walls and allowed only its strongest and coldest soldiers entry, but maybe here, with these gentle beings, he could find a place. 

And so, on the third day, Aziraphale went down into the garden, sheathing his flaming sword for the first time since the war. And he introduced himself to Adam and Eve, and listened to Adam naming the plants and animals, and listened to Eve joking and laughing, and the weight on his heart had begun to lift. 

And then, on the eighth day, the unspeakable happened. Man fell, just as half of Heaven– demons, they were demons now, no longer angels, no matter how recently they had been– had Fallen not so long ago. And Aziraphale was a soldier. He wasn’t meant to offer comfort. Wasn’t meant to give away his one source of protection against the ever-encroaching dangers of Hell. 

But he was also soft, and kind, and perhaps a little bit weak at heart, and he _loved_ these humans, despite everything and everyone telling him he oughtn’t. And so Aziraphale ushered them out of Paradise, pushed them into the harsh wilderness of the unknown, but he gave comfort where he could, a flaming sword for protection and light and warmth in this new place, a piece of himself given away. A piece he had hated, yes, but a piece all the same. 

And when God asked about the sword, Aziraphale reacted in instinct. Instinct as a protector, as a guardian, as a soldier. He had given himself to the humans to shield them, and shield them he would, even at the risk of Her wrath– a risk he had never been more aware of than in that moment. He lied to God, and he got away with it. And then he was given no further orders. No further instruction. 

And so Aziraphale followed what instructions he had. After all, he was a soldier. He was made to obey. 

Aziraphale stood upon the wall, watching to the East. Watching as Adam and Eve moved ever further away, guided by the light of his sword. 

And then a demon approached him, slithered right up beside him and began to talk. 

Aziraphale was a soldier, and a very good one. But he had never liked it. And after all, he’d given away his flaming sword– he couldn’t be blamed for not striking the demon down, as he had no weapon with which to strike. And if it so happened that the demon didn’t strike, either, that he even comforted Aziraphale, in a way, that it felt entirely natural to lift his wing over the creature and shield it from the newly falling rain, well. Aziraphale never had liked being a soldier. He much preferred being soft. 

And then time passed, and Aziraphale remained on Earth, under Gabriel’s command. He never was quite as strict as Michael had been, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t demanding in his own way. Aziraphale was never given a chance to slip up, to make a mistake, before it was being (occasionally quite forcibly) corrected. Restrictions on miracles and severe reprimands. But Aziraphale bore it all, because he was, at heart, still a soldier. And he would do what he could to protect this world, to protect its humans, to shield the descendants of the first creatures he’d loved. 

Though Aziraphale grew less and less sure of what he was protecting the humans from with each passing day. Because the demon was here, too, the demon Crowley, and bit by bit, Aziraphale found he was protecting _him_ , as well. And that was dangerous. Because if Heaven could leave Aziraphale shaking in fear, if they could leave him crumpled and crying, and they were Good and Right and Holy, then surely what Hell was doing to Crowley was worse. And Aziraphale could bear punishment. He could withstand pain. He was a soldier, after all. But Crowley… 

Crowley was not a soldier. Crowley was an _artist_. He’d helped to create the stars, so long ago. He’d Fallen for asking questions (and Aziraphale had so many questions, oh so very many, but he was a soldier, and he was an angel, and he never asked, no matter how desperately he longed to). Crowley had withstood pain already, far more than any creature deserved– of that, Aziraphale was certain, the war had been punishment enough for all involved and the Fall was simply cruel– and Aziraphale didn’t want to see him suffer further. And if Heaven, if the side of Good, made Aziraphale wish on occasion that he could destroy himself to escape, then the side of Evil must have been willing to go that extra step, get their own hands dirty with it. And Aziraphale, the soldier, the guardian, the soft-souled being who’d taken this demon, the poor, broken, secretly-kind and openly devious tempter, into his heart, simply couldn’t allow that to happen. 

It was in 1941, when one bomb dropped on Aziraphale’s head and another exploded in his heart, that he was able to put a name on it. Love. He loved Crowley– he was _in love_ with Crowley– and there was a chance that the demon felt the same. And this was after Aziraphale, in a panic, had pushed him away. After they’d not spoken for eighty years. After he’d proven himself to be just as cruel and cold as those he’d fought alongside so many eons ago. And, soft though he was, Aziraphale was a soldier. For all that identity had been dragged from the grave, kicking and screaming, by this terrible war, and the one before it, and every war the humans fought that Heaven decided was worthy of angelic intervention– which was most of them. Aziraphale was sent in, sent onto the front lines, forced to fight instead of healing for as long as Heaven wanted him there. He was a soldier, not meant for double- and triple-crosses, and Crowley, the artist, able to weave truth and lies and miracles all just as well as music or paint or cloth or starlight, had swooped in and saved him. Saved the books. 

He hadn’t needed to do that, but he’d done it anyways. Out of kindness. Out of _love_ , in whatever form that took for him, whether a simple desire to not be alone or something deeper and far more profound. 

Aziraphale was in love. And he was soft. And he’d always hated fighting, hated war, hated killing. But he was still a soldier, deep down. He’d wept later on, after the war in Heaven had been won, but during the fighting, he’d been ruthless. He’d been _cold_. And so he drew on that, on that training, that hard-wired ability to push his emotions to the back of his mind and do what needed to be done, when he sat in the neon-lit car in Soho and handed over the weapon that could end the life of the one he loved above all else, handing over a piece of himself in the process, a symbol of his angelic nature, a part of him that he valued far more than he ever had the flaming sword. 

And then Crowley had _looked_ at him, open and vulnerable even with the sunglasses in the way, and he’d offered a promise, “anywhere you wanna go” ( _stay with me, angel, let me thank you with this even if I can’t with words, let me show you how much this means to me_ ), and Aziraphale had always hated being a soldier, but he’d bit back his tears, bit back the words that nearly spilled out ( _I love you, don’t leave me, don’t take this weapon and use it to end yourself, don’t go to a place where I can’t protect you any longer_ ) and instead thrown up one last shield. With it, he tore down the remains of any others that were left. 

_“You go too fast for me, Crowley.”_

An admission couched in deniability, a promise of his own, a promise of _maybe_ , of _someday_ , of _in a world where I am soft and you are good and it is alright to be that way, where we are open with who we wish to be_. Aziraphale was a soldier, but he’d always hated it, and when he arrived home that night he cried, for only the second time in his life. 

And then the end of the world arrived. And Aziraphale was still, even after everything, a soldier. The identity he’d built for himself here on Earth– fussy, prim, clever, guardian, gentle, _soft_ – fell away further the closer the end drew. He felt himself pulled apart, torn in two. Soldier and scholar. Killer and lover. Angel and not. And at first, he chose wrong. Duty won out. He pushed Crowley away, hurt him in the act of trying to save him, praying desperately to a God he was nearly certain would never hear to do the job that he could not and protect the only thing worth protecting in this universe. And then Aziraphale was back in Heaven, in the cold and empty space it had become after the Fall, and he saw what being a soldier of Heaven had become. His platoon was waiting for him, ready to follow his command once more, and the old wound in his celestial form smarted once more, and the Quartermaster screamed at him– he had been in love, before the Fall, completely giddy with it, and then his lover had died at the enemy’s hands (that was the official line, but it had been so hard to tell, the war had happened before the Fall and all angels look alike in the heat of battle) and he had gone cold, just like the rest of them– and Aziraphale made a choice. 

He had always hated being a soldier, even though he was good at it, even though it was easy. But he _loved_ being soft. He loved being kind, and warm, and _good_ instead of “Good”, and he loved being in love, and he loved being loved in return. And so he chose Earth, and humanity, and Crowley, Crowley most of all, and he left being a soldier behind. 

And then the world didn’t end, thanks to a brilliant human boy who chose love over everything. And then relief washed over an almost-empty airfield, and a rag-tag group of saviours exchanged phone numbers and laughs. And then an angel and a demon, a soldier and an artist, two beings desperately in love and free for the first time ever, sat on a bench, and then a bus, and then a sofa in Mayfair, and they talked. Talked about a prophecy, and the wrath of Heaven and Hell. 

They didn’t talk about the love that had remained unspoken for six thousand years. It was still too dangerous. There simply wasn’t time. 

As much as he hated it, and although he had chosen otherwise, Aziraphale was still a soldier. Still a guardian. And while Crowley was in danger, Aziraphale couldn’t allow himself even a moment of weakness. So he had kept on his buttoned-up and well-worn armour, and he had worried the scrap of paper between fingers that itched for the burn of a sword they had held for the first time in six thousand years just mere hours ago, and he had bottled up any emotions that might have spilled out– any but love, he let himself feel love, love for the Earth and love for the humans and love for Crowley, Crowley most of all, Crowley more than anything, for what was he fighting for now if not for love?– and he had planned. 

The plan had worked, and the executions failed (Aziraphale had been surprised by the mercy of Hell, they had hardly hurt him at all beyond the crack on the head, and they had offered a trial, even if it was a bit of a sham), and they dined at the Ritz, and a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square, and the world– despite everything– continued to turn. 

After lunch, Aziraphale and Crowley retuned to the bookshop– together, of course. Aziraphale wasn’t sure Crowley would ever leave his side again, and Aziraphale certainly didn’t want him to. So together they went, picking up the Bentley first, and Crowley had crooned over his beloved car, and Aziraphale had giggled and jumped and laughed over his wonderful bookshop and the very interesting new editions that had been added, and then they had settled side by side on the old sofa in the back, wine in hand, and silence fell. 

Aziraphale reached out his hand, slowly, carefully. They hadn’t spoken of this, last night, not in the rush of planning and fear, not with Aziraphale refusing to let his guard down, refusing to let his emotions get the better of him. But here, now, they were alone. They were _safe_ , for the first time in six thousand years. 

Crowley took his hand, warm and gentle and certain, and Aziraphale felt the tears building again, tears he had only let spill twice before in his entire (long, long) life, and then blue eyes met gold and two bodies surged together and two pairs of lips met in a kiss six thousand years in the making. And Aziraphale let himself be soft, and gentle, and kind, and warm, and prim and clever and curious and selfish and hedonistic, and for it all he felt Crowley relaxing, too, Crowley who let himself be good and kind and sweet and loving and deferential and sharp and biting and a little bit bitter. Walls were crashing down around them, taller and stronger than those around Eden had ever been, and in the rubble stood the _people_ that they had fought so hard to become. 

_At heart, just a little bit, a good person._

_Just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing._

For the first time ever, entwined with Crowley, pressed together, happier than he’d ever been, Aziraphale felt as though he was no longer a soldier. No longer a warrior. He was still a guardian, yes, still an angel, even, but he could now choose for himself what to guard. _Who_ to guard. And he would do it in his own way, with words and gestures and kindness and softness and love, love, _love_ , so much love, enough to drown out the cold cruelty of Heaven and Hell and the Earth in between them, with nary a flaming sword in sight. 

Aziraphale sighed, brushing his fingers ever so gently through Crowley’s beautiful flame-red hair, disheveled and wonderful. 

“You alright, angel?” Crowley asked, golden eyes wide and trusting, and Aziraphale felt so full of love that he thought he might burst. 

Instead, he just smiled, warm and gentle and soft, not a soldier’s smile at all. 

“Yes, my love,” he answered, pressing a kiss to Crowley’s lips, soft and gentle and brief but with the promise of more, always more, making up for six thousand years of lost time. “I am.” 

For the first time ever, Aziraphale wasn’t a soldier at all. And that was exactly how he liked it.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!!! Kudos and comments are super appreciated


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